The subject of this invention is a stabilizing prosthesis device or stabilizing brace particularly for use by paraplegic patients.
As is known, people afflicted by varying degrees of paralysis of the lower limbs have been forced heretofore to make continuous use of wheelchairs in order to enjoy a measure of mobility and independence. Still nowadays, the upright stance can only be ensured for paraplegic patients through the application of static apparatus to which they are bound, or alternatively through large-size apparatus such as, for example, caliper splints, which encircle the lower limbs and the pelvis, thereby blocking articulation of the ankle, knee and hip joints in order to prevent the patient's lower limbs from collapsing under gravity.
It is only by the application of such large-size apparatus, and following extended training, that a limited number of paraplegic patients succeed to make just a few steps with their lower limbs held stretched rigidly in the apparatus itself. They are forced, anyhow, to stand on the lower limbs by leaning on walking sticks or crutches.
The few steps that such patients occasionally succeed to make require cnsiderable effort on their part, and do not in fact represent any improvement in the patient's independence because the patient can not attend to any activities either just standing up or whilst walking, because all of his/her concentration and physical effort is required to merely maintain his/her rather uncertain balance.
To pursue his/her habitual tasks, the patient is forced, therefore, to make continuous use of a wheelchair, in which the patient has his/her upper limbs available for ordinary and occupational bodily movements.
Thus, a patient such as a paraplegic patient, afflicted with at least partial paralysis of the lower limbs is afforded as yet neither orthopedic instruments which can permit him/her to assume a safe upright stance in which to simultaneously attend to other manual activities, nor orthopedic instruments enabling a physiological gait for a minimum expenditure of energy whilst being aesthetically acceptable.